SCHOOL CLIMATE & CULTURE

School environments must welcome and engage

The Prichard Committee recognizes that schools must foster an environment that welcomes and supports each student and family if all kids are to succeed. They must offer every student access to rigorous assignments, advanced coursework, career pathways, and opportunities to achieve beyond proficiency. They must also ensure that each student’s strengths are recognized and built upon, both across curriculum and by realizing gifts, talents, and learning differences that may require specialized services. Schools must engage students as active participants in their learning, ensuring that they take ownership of their own learning and be offered opportunities to contribute as equal partners in school and district decisions.

Schools must engage families as full collaborators in their children’s learning, drawing on family understanding of each student’s strengths and offering effective opportunities for families to tap into available supports and resources, including welcoming families’ advocates. Schools must also offer the most vulnerable students robust support to allow them to learn and grow. Adequate funding and support for Family Resource and Youth Services Centers is critical to give each school the capacity to address particular student and family needs.

We advocate that schools seek out independent assessments of school climate and culture informed by families, teachers, and student perspectives, giving high priority to addressing concerns that emerge. Evidence that students of different background receive appropriate learning opportunities, disciplinary consequences, or levels of respect must be addressed with frankness and energy.

Kentucky’s Early Childhood Development Fund uses 25% of Kentucky’s annual revenue from the 1998 Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement to support the full development of our youngest children. Here’s how the 2017-18 funding is being put to use under the budget adopted in 2016:$9,000,000 for the Health Access Nurturing Development Services (HANDS)$8,894,700 for the Early Childhood […]

| Post by Cory Curl | Last week, the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) released information about the readiness of incoming kindergarten students in the fall of 2017* – the children who will graduate from high school in 2030. The data include results for students overall, but also by gender, race/ethnicity, eligibility for free or reduced lunch, […]

| Post by Perry Papka | Over the last decade, Kentucky’s investment in need-based financial aid has not come close to keeping up with public tuition or with the cost of living.From 2008 to 2018, Kentucky saw: A 2% increase in funding for the College Access Program (CAP), from $60.5 million to $61.9 millionA 4% increase […]

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